Leak
by GreenGreyBlue
Summary: Everyone just assumed he enjoyed all the food he ate.


Cracking his eyes open, he glanced at his clock. It was eleven thirty-two and he was hungry. Rolling onto his back he reached up blindly feeling for the edge of a draw. He wasn't completely awake but he knows the feel of the draws by now. He could tell the difference between the top draws, his debts, and the bottom draws, his snacks. He pulls the bottom draw open, still not completely awake, and began to pull random foods from the draw. It was full of fruit, both fresh and dried. Different kinds of nuts, dried meat and a loaf of bread. He eats automatically, shoving random things in his mouth, mixing fruit and meat but not caring. He eats until he feels his hunger subside.

Feeling somewhat sated he slumps back down. Shuffling around in his bed, he shoves his head under the pillow, enjoying the cool, and falls asleep.

…

He wakes again. As always the first thing he does is glance at his clock. It's one thirty-eight in the morning, and he's hungry again. The hunger has doubled in the last two hours and he feels as if a hand is holding his stomach, trying to pull it downwards. His stomach rumbles loudly and Link moves in his sleep. He mentally tries to silence his stomach, not wanting to wake the man on the floor beside him. More awake than last time, but still dazed with sleep, he fumbles for the draw containing food.

Trying to be silent so as not to wake Link, he pulls out food and starts to eat. He eats an entire salami, five carrots, a bag of nuts, the half of loaf of bread that still remains, six apples and fistfuls of sultanas. Some what sated, but still a bit hungry, he lays back and tried to sleep again. He's still a little hungry but decided that enough was enough, and he needed to sleep.

…

Three thirty-two he wakes. If anything his hunger is regular with two hour intervals. He sits up, feeling heavy, and blindly fumbles around trying to find the handle for his snack draw. Pulling it open he reaches his hand in, only to find bare wood. Sitting up and forcing himself awake he looks into the draw. Empty… completely empty.

He lays back with a sigh wondering what to do. If Link wasn't there, he could easily get up and go down to the cafeteria. It was open twenty-four seven, after all, no one ever knew when an Exorcist or a group of finders would return from a mission. He didn't want to have to wake the man to go get something to eat. As annoying as it was to have someone watch him all the time, he didn't want to disturb the man's sleep. If Allen went without him, leaving him to sleep, he would be accused of something stupid, like treachery. He didn't want to be accused of treachery for an early morning snack. He would just have to put up with it.

Laying back, slowly becoming more lucid, he starts to think of ways to get to the cafeteria. He wonders if he could get out the window and scale the building. Could he manage to get out of the room without LInk noticing? Were bed sheets edible?

He briefly wondered if he could open an Ark gate right below his bed that opened out onto the cafeteria. It was a gross use of his power as the operator of the Ark but with the way his stomach was revolting he had to wonder . Surely he could drop through the floor and back again with out Link noticing him. It was tempting.

With a rumbling stomach he rolled to his side with a groan. He wrapped his arms around his stomach, trying to elevate the pain, knowing it would do nothing. At that point he knew that the psychical motions were useless, but somehow calmed his stomach mentally. Wrapping his arms around his stomach did nothing, but putting pressure on his stomach helped his mind. There was a small dulling, but he was still hungry. So hungry.

His stomach rumbled and he cursed the noise.

"Are you hungry, Walker?" Link asked.

Allen cringed, hating that his stomach was so loud it had woken and inconvenienced someone else.

"It's okay, I can wait for breakfast," he said.

"This is the third time tonight you have woken."

He stated it, not questioned, and Allen realised that Link had been awake every time he had woken.

"I'm sorry," he whispered into the dark, "I didn't want to wake you."

"Are you hungry?" Link asked.

"Always," Allen whispered back.

He knew no one could hear them in their room, but he felt the need to whisper. He guessed it was the dark of the night. He always felt the need to whisper when talking at night.

"I have some butter cakes. Would you like them?"

"Yes!" Allen said, forgetting to whisper.

Link pulled a tray of butter cakes from out of his own storage and handed them over.

"They're quiet a delicate process," Link said sitting up, "You have to whip the butter with the sugar to the right degree or the flavour is lost. When mixing it with the flour you have to be careful as…"

He was cut off by the sound of metal hitting the floor. He had fallen back to sleep, the metal tray that once held the cakes empty and on the floor. There was a small content smile on his face. Link sighed at his ways, he'd just eaten an entire tray of some of his best cakes and didn't even appreciate them. The lose of his butter cakes weren't that bad. After all he kept them in the room for Walkers sake. He knew the boy woke in the night hungry, and often ran out of food. He kept the food there to avoid walking down to the cafeteria at random hours.

He lay back and attempted sleep, trying to forget about his cakes gone to waste. Next time he wouldn't bother baking and just raid the food stores.

…

Waking again the nausea was worse. He was so hungry he felt the need to throw up. His stomach churned and rumbled, the noises echoing around his already empty stomach. _'Where did it go?_' he thought, already knowing. His innocence ate it all. He knew he should have been use to it, but he never did. Ever since the moment his innocence first activated his hunger had doubled, and tripled and multiplied to numbers his mind couldn't even calculate. It was always at a level he could bare though. But ever since the Ark his need had become worse. As if he wasn't just feeding the innocence and himself, but the Noah inside himself. He didn't know if it was the Noah or the fact that he had pushed himself so far passed the one hundred percent synchronisation. Either way, he was more hungry.

When he first realised just how hungry he was, he started to watch the other wielders of parasitic innocence.

Krory ate a lot, more than most, but he never ate as much as him. Krory seemed to be somewhere in-between, he ate more that everyone else, but he seemed to compensate the rest of his hunger by drinking Akuma blood. As long as he was sent on enough missions Krory was fine. Considering the positioning of the war, and being placed under General Sokaro, there was plenty for Krory to drink, enough to sate himself. The blood he drank seemed to sate him in a way he would never know, because he never eaten like him, and he had never run into Krory late at night at the cafeteria.

The only other Parasitic innocence to observe was General Nyne. Watching her for the first time it was obvious she didn't feel the hunger like he did. Her innocence directly took in the food needed. It was strange watching her tiny monkey jumping around and swallowing large amounts of food while Nyne herself ate a Greek salad with a side of grilled fish.

There was only one more parasitic innocence that he knew of, a man he had never known. Suman Dark, a man with a deformed arm just like his. He must have known of the pain he went through. His stomach rumbling and causing him pain. He wished he had actually met him. He wished that he could talk to someone, about what it was like to feel continuous hunger. But he was gone.

He accepted that he was the only one that needed the large amounts of food.

His stomach rumbled again and he wrapped his arms around his stomach again, trying his hardest to press the hunger out of his stomach with his hands. He felt sick, he needed to eat.

"Walker?" Link said.

"Yes?"

"Would you like to get up for breakfast?"

"It's too early," Allen said, holding his stomach tighter.

"It's just before six. I think it's time enough."

"Alright," Allen said relieved.

Getting up and dressing was hard, he just wanted to eat but he couldn't just get up in his bed clothes and run for the food. He took his time trying to make himself seem as normal as possible.

He was hungry, so hungry. It annoyed him that they only time he didn't feel hunger was in battle. During battle he was focused, he didn't feel the hunger, just the Akuma, or the Noah. It annoyed him that the moment he deactivated his innocence the hunger returned. When activating his innocence his hunger disappeared, it was all about the battle. He likened it to a survival instinct, not feelinging hunger or pain. When he deactivated that was when he felt psychical wounds and the hunger.

He distracted himself from the hunger by thinking that in the long run his hunger was worth it. Every time he released a trapped soul it was worth it. Every time he saved someone from being destroyed by an Akuma it was worth it. Every time he deactivated, the hunger was worth it, it meant he had saved a soul or a life. The pain of hunger was worth it.

"Are you ready? Link said.

"Yup," he said with a smile.

They walked to the cafeteria, the whole while he resisting the urge to run. He just wanted to get there as soon as possible, but running would make him seem suspicious. He had to think of Link at his side. If he ran it could be taken any which way. Most likely in a bad way.

At the end they reached the cafeteria and he anxiously waited in line.

"Hey there, Cutie," Jerry said.

Without the normal pleasantries he started to list off random dishes. He stared with bacon and eggs, a normal morning meal, but then continued. He listed off stews, casseroles and soups, asian dishes full of rice, beef dumplings and rice balls. At the end he ordered a desert, his Mitorashi Dango. Everyone just assumed he liked the desert, but in truth it was like everything else he ordered. Rice filled him up more than other foods, a good thick beef stew did as well, along with chicken casserole. The sweet rice dumplings just helped to fill him up along with everything else.

It took a trolly to get all his food to a spare table. Although everyone was use to his eating habits, he still felt self conscious about the amount of food he ate. He didn't want anyone looking at the towers of food, or they way he ate it. He couldn't help the way he ate. They didn't know the hunger. Yet looking at Links trolly of sweets he had to wonder if perhaps Link was a kindred spirit. Sitting down he set a few plates out and started on them.

He cleared them quickly, piling the empty plates to the side. He dealt out another set of plates. He dove into them like the ones already finished. In the middle of it all Lenalee sat across from him.

"Morning, Allen."

"Hello, Lenalee," he said between mouthfuls.

She ate her own meal, a bowl of rice and some grilled fish. Something that was a mere mouthful to him. He had to wonder what it was like to have equipment type innocence. There was no hunger involved, and sure there was plenty of psychical stimulation involved, but it just wasn't the same. In a way he felt Lenalee could understand him in some way. She was the only one he knew besides himself that had and innocence willing to protect accommodator. That was one thing she could understand, but the hunger, that was something else.

"Are you more hungry than usual this morning?" she asked.

Always hungry,

"No more than usual," he said.

He began to make a show. He ate his food, making a show that every thing he ate was the best thing he ever ate. He hummed and moaned at the tastes he couldn't experience. In truth there was very little he could taste. Some salt, maybe some soy sauce, if he was lucky he could taste the rice.

Lenalee chuckled.

She chuckled at him, not in a demeaning way, she wasn't the kind. She still chuckled and Allen had to pause. She thought his way of eating cute, his ravenous hunger was amusing to her in some way, and it hurt him. Despite the hurt he smiled back at her and continued to eat. He continued the show, even though he didn't taste the food. It was just a different kind of pressure in his stomach.

Across the room he noticed another exorcist. Kanda. He was sitting down to a bowl of Soba noodles with all the sidings.

Kanda was like him in a way. Everyone assumed and made jokes about how he would only eat Soba, everyone assumed and made jokes that he enjoyed everything he ate. He enjoyed his food just like a starving man would enjoy a simple egg sandwich. It was food, that was all.

Having been on missions with Kanda he had seen the man eat what was available. He knew that Kanda ate Soba because he enjoyed it. He ate as much of it as he could because it could be weeks before he ate it again. When returning Kanda would eat Soba because he missed the taste. He was jealous. He didn't crave any sort of food. Just any food, as long as it was there.

Ordering certain types of food made it easier, but how he wished to be like Kanda. He wished he could order and enjoy a plate of food simply for the taste of it.

He didn't taste his food. The moment it entered his mouth the sensation was gone.

He ate, watching Kanda's back, trying to talk with Lenalee.

"Are you finished, Allen?" she said with a smile.

He was angry with her before, but seeing her smile he forgot his anger. He couldn't be angry with her, she was just too cute and bubbly, although it was a little forced.

"Yeah, I'm finished," he said, stacking his last plate.

"Do you want to go train with me?" she said, "I need to test out my new innocence."

"Sure," he said standing.

"Let's go," she said with a cheerful smile.

He really couldn't be angry with her. Never her.

They walked away from the cafeteria, heading towards the training hall. He glanced once more towards Kanda, eating his Soba. He imagined he was happy.

"I've restocked the draws," Link whispered in his ear as the walked.

"Wha?" Allen asked.

"They're full, I assure you."

Walking to the training grounds Allen felt some what relieved. Because someone else understood, even if it had come from the most unlikely of places.

…

**This came from multiple fan fics. **

**In all of them Allen makes a show and eats lots of food, loving it all.**

**But really, don't you think needing to eat that amount of food would be a curse?**

**I'm sure the moment I post this, the idea will be stolen by someone else.**

**Completed in one night with minimal spell checks. It was random piece so I didn't sit on it.**

**Although in the morning I know I'm going to wake up and wish I had written more.**

**Should I have?**


End file.
